![]() They’ve fallen to 400-500 before and bounced back. While wolf predation is partly responsible, necropsies indicate the biggest cause was starvation from overpopulation.Įven though relatively few moose calves appear to be surviving to adulthood, there’s no reason to worry about the moose’s immediate future, Michigan Tech biologist Rolf Peterson said. The moose population’s 28% drop from 2022 is one of the biggest one-year collapses ever seen at the park, it said. A new pack also appears to be forming, the report said. There were three groups of at least three wolves each, and a few loners or pairs. This year’s field study detected an 11-member pack on the main island’s eastern side and a five-member pack on the western side. But their descendants are believed to have produced at least seven litters of pups. Only a few are believed still alive - hardly surprising as wild wolves seldom live longer than five years, Hoy said. They brought in 19 wolves from Minnesota, Ontario’s Michipicoten Island and Michigan’s Upper Peninsula in 2018-19. That could mean park managers will need to import a few wolves every decade or so, Hoy said. The sprawling archipelago’s closest point to the mainland is about 15 miles (25 kilometers) away. Global warming is causing fewer ice bridges to form on Lake Superior, reducing the likelihood of wolves trekking from the mainland to the park and diversifying the gene pool. Even now, its balsam firs continue to deteriorate from moose browsing and an attack of tree-killing spruce budworm, the report said.Įxperts acknowledge the same factors that nearly wiped out the wolves - primarily inbreeding - eventually could return. Park officials and Michigan Tech scientists contend the absence of a top-of-the-food-chain predator of moose and beaver would have been ruinous for the island’s forest. “Species come and species go,” Proescholdt said, arguing that the federal Wilderness Act “directs us to let nature call the shots and not impose our human desires.” Some experts said they should be allowed to die out, as have other species that once occupied the island, including Canada lynx and woodland caribou, which had the same predator-prey relationship as today’s wolves and moose. But inbreeding finally took its toll on the wolves, whose numbers plummeted between 20. Both populations rose and fell over the years, influenced by disease, weather, parasites and other factors. Moose provided an ample food supply for the wolves, which in turn helped keep moose numbers in check.
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